


Biography of a go pro

by orphan_account



Category: Hikaru no Go
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-10-07
Updated: 2007-10-07
Packaged: 2017-10-13 02:25:18
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 747
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/131792
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ficlet.  This is the path that Honda chooses.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Biography of a go pro

You remember being born. It is one of your unique characteristics in what otherwise turns out to be a strikingly ordinary life. You remember the overwhelming brightness of light, the precision of sound in air, the nurses looming over you. The hospital smelled of blood and your mother’s pain. You were not one of those babies that cry at birth, you remember that.

You don't recall taking your first breath, but of course, that is something no baby would be expected to remember.

  
* * * * *

  
Your memories are a series of firsts: the first time you entered the child meijin tournament, the first time you walked past the sliding doors of the Go Institute, becoming an insei, the first time you took the pro exam.

You don't remember the first time you touched the squares of a 13x13 board; the first time you held the stones, clumsily, between thumb and index finger. What you remember from early childhood is emotion: the thrill of discovering something you were better at than other people, and best of all you _enjoyed_ it. You didn't just play to win, you also played to play, obsessively and tenaciously until your parents gave in and bought you boards, stones, books of _kifu_. Quietly they were proud of their talented son. You felt it and basked in their pleasure.

From your teens you remember competition, insecurity, testosterone drive. You had a crush on Nase, like every boy of a certain age did. The infatuation was short-lived. You never had the courage to do anything about it and not even in your most optimistic fantasies could you imagine Nase returning your feelings. Not a girl who could have anyone she wanted. She chose a software engineer, handsome enough to make Isumi pale by comparison.

(Years later you fall in love and marry a girl who is neither pretty nor ugly, she has two crooked teeth and a beautiful smile. You quarrel, not the shouting matches that send Waya scurrying to the bar for alcohol and sympathy, grumbling about his lovely, tempestuous girlfriend, but slower sulkier affairs because you are not aggressive and neither is she. You are happy. Perhaps happy is too strong a word; this is not what you had in mind when you were young and dreamed about happiness. You are content.

It's a mundane concept, but do you think Shindou Hikaru or Touya Akira can claim to be content?)

  


* * * * *

Waya has seasonal crises about his ability, yet he defeats you three games out of five. What is it to you? Shindou Hikaru plays joseki so clever you can almost see the stones dazzling brilliant against wood. What is it to you?

The god did not choose you the way he chose Touya Akira, but you chose _igo_ , reached out by the call of the talent that was in you, the desire, the joy of the path you'll walk all your life.

You are a Go professional....

  


* * * * *

Your children grow up, and you grow old watching them grow. You play _igo_. You are a reasonably good father, you suppose. No worse than your parents were. Your children are determined not to resemble you. You think that's a good thing. You don't want them to love Go, but one of them does anyway, your only daughter. You watch her with an anxious eye, but she likes _shougi_ better. Not that that's any better. _Shougi_ , _igo_ , it's all the same. The way of a thousand defeats. The way you chose and keep choosing everyday.

She walks her road, parallel to yours, and privately you suspect that you love her best.

Midlife crisis comes and goes. You win a few titles, even Honinbou for one year. Shindou is in hospital with a stroke that year, but even with him not there, even with all the things you have learnt, it feels like a dream. All the things you used to want have either come in your grasp or ceased to matter. New longings have come into your heart in their place: your youngest to graduate with first-class Honours, to be defeated at Go by your daughter, a trip to New Zealand with your wife. But you have learnt to wait. You have learnt the hard slow climb of contentment.

You die dreaming in your sleep and your old-man dreams have nothing to do with slate-white stones or glossy _masame_ boards but are of weather and grandchildren's voices and the curry rice you had for dinner, earlier that night.


End file.
